Efficacy of a Multiplex BangasureTM RT-PCR Kit for the Detection of COVID-19

The outbreak of the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) corona virus (CoV)-2 continues to increase globally. To control the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) transmission, diagnose is very important step which would help in the process of quarantine, isolation of the infected person and also in contact tracing. Among the various techniques real-time reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (rRT-PCR) is mostly used and considers as gold standard method for viral nucleic acid detection as per World Health Organization (WHO) and Centre for Diseases Control (CDC), USA. However, possible false-negative and false-positive results produce misleading consequences, making it necessary to improve existing methods. So, investigators need a robust and reliable PCR kit to detect different kinds of variant of SARS-CoV-2 virus to reduce its transmissibility and take preventive management plan. Beside that to manage the increasing number of testing, investigators are mostly dependent on imported test kit which seems to be very difficult at this pandemic situation and costly. Hence, virulence of SARS-CoV-2 virus may change rapidly due to mutation and country become hot spot so, gene detection RT-PCR kit is time demand. In this point of view, investigator's aim to develop an validate multiplex rRT-PCR qualitative diagnostic method, which targets two viral genes E (envelope protein), N (nucleocapsid gene, according to the CDC, USA guidelines for the development of RT-PCR kit and one human gene RNase P as internal control simultaneously. This is a case control study where will analyze 120 samples (60 COVID-19 positive and 60 COVID-19 negative both fresh and frozen) from Institute of Epidemiology, Disease Control and Research (IEDCR). This specimen will be blinded before supplying over to NILMRC/Contact ROL/ Bangladesh Clinical Trail Limited (BCTL), Dhaka, Bangladesh for Bangladesh Reference Institute for Chemical Measurements (BRiCM) RT-PCR Kit. Required in house validat